Saturday, December 06, 2008

Well I just sat my grade 2 piano exam today. I've been playing for almost exactly 1 year, and did my grade 1 approximately 6 months ago. I was feeling that I'd bit off a bit more than I could chew.

Grade 2 was MUCH harder than grade 1. One of the most difficult things about grade 2 is the scales, you have to play them simultaneously with both hands. I thought I'd mastered this, but my nerves got the better of me in the exam and I butchered the very first scale I was asked to do. This was F Major, and about 3 or 4 notes into it I realised that I'd run out of fingers on my left hand. I forced myself to bodge my way through the rest of the scale.

I made a few more silly errors on my scales and arpeggios, and there were two instances where I stopped and asked the examiner if I could do it again. Hopefully that didn't cost me too many marks. Fortunately B minor harmonic (which is a sod to play with both hands) went really well.

I was then asked to play the 3 pieces. I started with A:3 "Bouree" (L. Mozart). That generally went OK apart from a few notes I mangled up in the first couple of phrases.

The next piece B:3 "The Bee" actually went remarkably well. I find this a very difficult piece to play because it is fast and the ending is a bit fiddly. I always thought that if I messed up a piece it would be this one, but amazingly it turned out to be Bouree I messed up - the piece I was most comfortable with.

The final piece was C:3 "Garage Sale". This is a piece that does nothing at all for me, but I chose it because it's easy. Why are the "C" examination pieces always so naff? I wonder if anyone ever chose the godawful "The Temple by the Sea".

The sight reading went pretty smoothly this time. I didn't have any problems with it. It was in a simple key signature and was in 2:4. The aural test was pretty straightforward too.

On the whole I think definitely a pass. I'd be pleased with a merit, but I think that a distinction is totally out of the question primarily due to my massacre of F major at the beginning.

Below are some vids of me playing the 3 pieces. They were recorded on the same day of the exam. The dynamics aren't too clear in these videos. Please rest assured that I was giving the piano a good bash in all the "forte" bits, but the piano's volume is turned quite low so it's hard to get much light and shade across.